Need help with 3D IJN Yamato Turret Mechanism

[renogaza]

can someone help me acquire accurate and extremely detailed information
about the firing, loading, feedback and aiming mechanisms of the yamato's
guns?

i need to build a 90~100% accurate 3D cad/skp model of the yamato's
18.1in guns as an addition to my current project, i will accept any format.

i need info on how the barrel retracts from recoil, full barrel length, the
shock absorbers and hydraulics, the sealing method of the gun breach,
the gun breach door mechanism, breach door thickness, the bore length,
the bore type, fulcrum location, armor thickness, shell length to diameter,
size of cordite/"gun bag", no. of crew per turret, aiming mechanism,
aiming booth, fire control system, powerplant, shell delivery, cordite
delivery and lastly, turret exits

thank you for any and all the information you can offer :D

project details:

http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?mid=e827a991612b02cf680d26584156af46&prevstart=0

or: http://www.mediafire.com/?tncl1z7wdnzf3yx

(pls download google sketchup 7 or 8 below to view the project):
http://sketchup.google.com/download/gsu.html

[Sailor Steve]

WELCOME ABOARD! :sunny:

This should give you some of the information you require.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNJAP_18-45_t94.htm

[renogaza]

WELCOME ABOARD! :sunny:

This should give you some of the information you require.
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNJAP_18-45_t94.htm

thank you steve, i'm not sure if this is just what i needed
(because theirs quite a bit to read xD), your contribution
is much appreciated :D

photographs of other details would be good, as well as
detailed diagrams, thank you for any and all information
you can offer :D

[Chad]

It looks like you're creating a VERY HIGH resolution model of the Yamato. Very impressive :up:

[Sledgehammer427]

Renogaza from the looks of it the Japanese used a similar system as the US.

(Going from memory here, might be a little rusty)
The fulcrum point was just before the cutouts in the turret face.
The breech mechanism was probably an interrupted screw system

here's a picture of a US 16 inch gun turret, should be relatively close to the system the japanese used.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/images/turret-16inch.jpg[IMG]file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/ADMINI%7E1/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot.pnghttp://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/images/turret-16inch.jpg

now, as for aiming.

on a good day the turret recieved information from the director on the foretop. This used radar to get precise range information and had a stereoscopic system as backup.
If the turret stopped receiving information from the fire control computer the turret would switch to local control. This was entirely stereoscopic, and thats why there are "wings" on the back part of the turret, this houses the lenses for the rangefinder withing the turret.
I had the good fortune to be inside the turret of a battleship at the last SUBSIM meet. I believe there are some pictures we got of the interior.

[renogaza]

i found a person who designed a sratch built 1/100th scale model of the
guns i'm working on, can you compare if the design works/is valid and
can compete against the iowa guns?

heres the url:
http://www.modelshipgallery.com/gallery/bb/ijn/yamato-100-jd/jd-index.html

i'm just about done making the gun, counterweight and breach hatch,
i'll do the final finish on it later, now i need to do the gun chamber and
fulcrum-pivot point.. still trying to figure out the shell and powder bags
lifts and the storage rooms.

heres a couple of pics of the unfinished product:

http://img835.imageshack.us/f/yammy10.jpg/

http://img29.imageshack.us/i/yammy20.jpg/

http://img4.imageshack.us/i/yammy30.jpg/

http://img403.imageshack.us/i/yammysectioncut.jpg/

[Gerald]

:salute:

[Sledgehammer427]

That looks about as good as you can get it.

The model is spot on, But with no real reference pictures, you can only speculate.

I'd say your 3d model is very accurate. :up:
Keep up the good work!

[Subnuts]

The "Anatomy of the Ship" book on Yamato has a great number of schematics of one of the 18-inch turrets, but I don't have a scanner up and running at the moment. Maybe I could coax my camera into getting a few good shots...:06:

In the meantime, here's a cross-section through the No. 3 turret I scanned a while back: http://www.flickr.com/photos/27417638@N07/4612334997/in/set-72157623949245645/

[renogaza]

does the book, "Anatomy of the Ship: The Battleship Yamato"
include all the blueprints and specs for the entire ship as well
as photographs and profile sketches for the ship :o?????? i'm
thinking of buying it but i need to know if its the whole package
with all the ribbons and creampuffs on top :D

heres the link:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Battleship-Yamato-Anatomy-Ship/dp/0851779409
(£20.49 isn't all that bad :P)

the 18.1" L14 type 94 Main guns that i'm building is just a fraction of
my plan project to completely construct the Yamato interiors in 3d xD

[renogaza]

oh my god :o the clarity and complexity of detail in this
book is phenomenal, its mind boggling ._.
terrifyingly accurate information :dead:

yeah.. i think i'll stick with building the guns first and work
out the rest later, its too much to handle all in 1 go even
in a 1 year time frame unless i dedicate myself to it.

@topic: starting work on the main guns gun housing and
ammo storage rooms, i'll slice a piece of the ship to give
me a better idea of what i'm working with below deck.

does anyone know what the bearing sizes/count are for
the main gun turning ring and the and the stowage rings,
also how exactly the shell loading system works?

thank you so much everyone for the magnificent and valuable
information you all have offered, many many thanks :salute:

[Sailor Steve]

I'm glad the book gave you what you needed. I don't have that one, but I do have the one on HMS Dreadnought, and the drawings are so complete and detailed you could build a model that would be accurate down to the rivet type and placement. It even has detailed drawings of each lifeboat!

[Madox58]

Any chance of getting the details for the Life Boats?
:o

[renogaza]

found out how many roller bearings, 80 per turret, also figured out the mechanism, a bit tricky to pull off but i think i can manage, the storaging system and monorail is all thats left to understand, finished making the turntable, fulcrum point and turret armour shell, the bits and pieces inside the gun cabin and the targeting controls room still need to be finished as well as access points in the back of the turret and to the roof of the turret and in the walls of the turntable.

can someone help me understand how the stowage system for the shells work, it seems to be sorted into a maze-like pattern with a push-pull system, but i cant follow the path for it.. also how many rooms there are for the cordite containers kept outside the turret?

thanks a lot guys :D



quote cut:
does anyone know what the bearing sizes/count are for
the main gun turning ring and the and the stowage rings,
also how exactly the shell loading system works?

thank you so much everyone for the magnificent and valuable
information you all have offered, many many thanks :salute:

[Tem]

I'm an shiplover about Yamato
:)


I can say that this is my little deviation
;)

but the things
the whole mechanism works the tower as 459 mm and the whole ship is a new design, and at that time an innovative
Janusz Skulski's book, "Anatomy of the ship - Battleship Yamato" was written in 1988, had only one amendment 10 years later, from that time in Japan has increased knowledge of the Yamato, especially on the wave of the 2005 movie "Men from Yamato"
in Japan there were about 20 studies showing the battleship designs, are unfortunately not available in Europeand very rare - they are very good in CGI graphics showing internal structures, their fragments can be can found on Youtube

[renogaza]

well, i have a new problem, i just checked some of the new information about the yamato's guns
(finding the latest researches by japan on it was really hard ._.) and as it turns out i made a BIG
mistake with the guns breach door hatch and recoil mechanism so ill have to try to re-do it again,
also i found a video of beautiful papercraft model of the same ship with very fine details of some
of the parts of the ship so i'll ask the video uploader if i could use his model as a map for more
updates on my ship,

heres the url link to the video, its on youtube :P http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tC8bVUYen20&feature=feedf

i also found some surviving documents about some of the ships interior but its in japanese so i
cant figure out the rooms dimensions and purpose and such, a friend from japan is helping me
figure it out but hes also having a bit of trouble because of the age of the documents, i also
found imitation documents by a survivor of the ship, he had measured and accurately drawn a
blueprint for every floor of the ship except for the captains quarters, plane stowage, crows
nest, fcs interiors, bridge interiors, chimney stack interiors and main gun interiors, but its a great
start for my later project, so yeah. again more visual aids like video's, photographs, diagrams,
books and blueprints will help me so much, i would appreciate any donations(NOT MONEY) to help
finish this project, thanks again for everything :D

offtopic: I'm actually a bit worried my model wont integrate properly with my later project to
convert the yamato class into its aircraft carrier counterpart, i actually have the carrier's
template done already but since it doesnt have interiors yet i can only hope and speculate
as to if it'll work out later on or not, wish me luck xD